OREANDA-NEWS. For the second day in a row, the Russian FX spot market enjoyed rather strong trading activity: the MICEX reported a total turnover of USD 5.3bn for USDRUB yesterday. Meanwhile, RUB remained under marked pressure, opening with a gap lower, whilst during the session USDRUB scratched 53.0. However, RUB regained some ground in the end, closing at 52.70 vs. USD (-1.5%) as Brent bounced up to USD 61.3/bbl (+0.3% on the day) in the second half of the day. The EM FX index closed about 0.2-0.4% weaker vs. USD: in particular, ZAR was 0.9% in the red, TRY slipped 0.5% and BRL declined 0.6%. NOK traded down 0.5%, whilst AUD and NZD lost around 1.0%. Overall, RUB’s correction barely raises any eyebrows here, since there was a number of factors in favour of that scenario, which we had outlined before.

Maxim Korovin, Tatiana Zueva
VTB Capital analysts